NASA is hosting a media teleconference at 1:30 p.m. EDT Tuesday, March 19, to announce new science from the agency’s first mission to return to Earth an asteroid sample that may contain unaltered material from the very beginning of our solar system.

Scientists searching the vastness of space for alien worlds that might support life face major challenges, one of which is that most stars are different from our Sun. Each type of star has different characteristics than can affect the chances of finding a habitable planet around them.

The agency’s Development and Advancement of Lunar Instrumentation, or DALI, program recently awarded 10 teams funding to mature spacecraft-based instruments for use in future lander missions, including those offered by commercial ventures through the Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) contract.

In 2021, the feat of navigation that is the Lucy mission will launch. To steer Lucy towards its targets doesn’t simply involve programming a map into a spacecraft and giving it gas money – it will fly by six asteroid targets, each in different orbits, over the course of 12 years.

Ralph, one of NASA’s most well-traveled space explorers, has voyaged far and accomplished much: Ralph obtained stunning images of Jupiter and its moons, followed by a visit to Pluto. And, in 2021, Ralph journeys to Jupiter’s Trojan asteroids. Ralph, however, is not an impossibly accomplished astronaut — it is a scientific instrument.

From designing rocket launch pad components and safer rotorcraft to improving flood and drought forecasts to modeling the formation of planetary disks, NASA will highlight supercomputing advances at SC18, the International Conference for High Performance Computing, Networking, Storage and Analysis, Nov. 12 to 15 in Dallas.

New tracking data confirms that NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft successfully completed its second Deep Space Maneuver (DSM-2) on June 28. DSM-2 was OSIRIS-REx’s last deep space maneuver of its outbound cruise to the asteroid Bennu, with arrival scheduled for Dec. 3.

NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft executed its second Deep Space Maneuver today, which put the spacecraft on course for its scheduled arrival at the asteroid Bennu in December. The mission team will continue to examine telemetry and tracking data as they become available and will have more information on the results of the maneuver over the next week.

In the last decade we have discovered thousands of planets outside our solar system and have learned that rocky, temperate worlds are numerous in our galaxy. The next step will involve asking even bigger questions. Could some of these planets host life? And if so, will we be able to recognize life elsewhere if we see it?

A storm of tiny dust particles has engulfed much of Mars over the last two weeks. NASA's Curiosity rover, which has been studying Martian soil at Gale Crater, is expected to remain largely unaffected by the dust.

Any telescope that reaches the launch pad in the 2030s likely will look much different than the concepts four teams are currently studying to inform the 2020 Decadal Survey for Astrophysics, but the studies do offer a roadmap.

The Sellers Exoplanet Environments Collaboration (SEEC) hosts its first annual symposium April 9-13. Researchers will discuss how our knowledge of the early solar system can help the hunt for life on other worlds.